DEC 11, 2016 — JAN 24, 2017

It’s a whole new….New Mexico!

Our trip to Fort Davis took us down below the New Mexico border, so it was due North for us for another hefty drive up the country. Right through oil country!

The ultimate destination was Albuquerque, but right in the middle (conveniently) was Roswell, New Mexico. Yes, where the “aliens” crashed. Amusingly, the town had a fairly decent dusting of snow, which happened to be our “first contact” for this winter road trip. That it was in the desert of New Mexico of all places(!), was fairly ironic.

We took in the rather humorous International UFO museum and “research centre,” and I’m sorry to say, the museum failed to convince me that an alien craft actually crash landed – the evidence was circumstantial at best, and relied purely on testimonies of a few people apparently involved. It was all a bit of fun though!

There isn’t really much else to do in Roswell, so we went out for some (new?) Mexican food and a few beers after doing a load of laundry.

The next morning we hit the road to Albuquerque, which fans of brilliant TV show Breaking Bad will know, is where Breaking Bad is set.

I found a convenient Google Maps plug in of all the locations, and Sara very kindly drove me around to look at a solid number of them (there were literally hundreds). We even made it to Los Pollos Hermanos, Gus Fring’s chicken joint in (very) south Abq. Sadly, in real life, it is mediocre burrito and burger company Twisters. I had to be sneaky at Walter White’s house as the owner was sitting in a chair in the garage – no way I could have thrown a pizza on the roof unfortunately!

Make sure you click the pictures below for the captions about each photo!

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After the tour, we checked out a local craft brewery (Nexus), and split a fried chicken sandwich, which was excellent.

That night, we went to a local burger joint, that has the “best burgers in town” – we can’t say if that’s true or not, but we thoroughly enjoyed what we have, and even got to check out the charcoal grill with the owner and his son – truly lovely people. Loved the green chilli on the burger too!

We were staying in Abq for a couple of nights, with the plan of making a day trip to the highest state capitol in the US – Santa Fe, which stands at over 7,000 feet above sea level. The city has a very Latin feel to it, particularly with regards to the architecture, and on a Monday lunchtime, the old town was very sleepy – we were happy to be back in Abq that night.

The plaque – Billy the Kid’s final “residence” before being sentenced to hang. Of course, he subsequently escaped and was shot… but still.

The plaque at the lower right is blown up nearby… this was originally a jail!

When we got back to Abq we had time for a couple of museums – the National Museum of Nuclear Science was first up. This was a really cool place to visit, and they have accumulated a vast arsenal of weaponry (including Little Boy and Fat Man “shells”), and explained the science and process behind enriching the uranium and plutonium for the only two nukes ever used in combat (here’s hoping it stays that way!). It’s quite interesting that the two bombs were different technologies – Little Boy was a uranium bomb with a gun-type mechanism (a uranium “bullet” is fired into a uranium core, creating a critical mass), whereas Fat Man was a plutonium bomb with an implosion trigger.. The museum also has retired bombers and fighters in its yard, and a DeLorean!!

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The second visit, just before closing time, was the Rattlesnake “museum”, although given the animals were alive (there were a few skeletons and a Steve Irwin shrine as well), a zoo is perhaps a more accurate name. This was cool. I enjoyed it, especially when the snakes started to rattle at me! Instagram followers may have already seen the videos, but here they are for others, and some pics from the relatively wide range of snakes!